Eight in the Night
by sunnyamazing
Summary: Post Always: One night that affects them all. Eight voices in the night. Each of them with different choices and different perspectives. Two: Jenny.
1. Gates

So this is my post Always fic. It will be eight chapters long, with each chapter focusing on a different character. Not all of them will have been seen in "Always" but they are still crucial to the storytelling. I plan to keep the updates close together as long as the muse keeps coming out to play.

Thanks to the wonderful Tadpole24 for her beta skills and for encouraging me to add more, I hope the few sentences that I added are to your enjoyment.

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**Eight in the Night.**

**One: Gates.**

The precinct is quiet, only the night shift remains.

The main four left long ago.

The one who isn't the cop hasn't been seen today.

The one who was described in her predecessors notes as the best he'd ever trained – bar none – has handed in her resignation.

The one who she suspended is gone too. She wonders if he will come back tomorrow. He wasn't apologetic for his actions, but then she never expected him to be.

Then there is the one who came to her for help. Who came to her because he had no other choice. Who came and told her where they had gone and who they were after.

He was the one who threw his arm over the side of the building – with no regard for his own safety.

She watched the interaction between his partner and himself. She watched him as he slumped into his chair.

She wanted to tell him that he'd done the right thing. To tell him that his friends were alive because of him. To tell him that it is better for them to be furious with him than to have him crying over a coffin.

He left eventually. He didn't push in his chair. He normally does. She had to leave her office and push it in for him. It didn't seem right with it out. And then she came back in here.

Her pen hovers over the paperwork that would send her two officers to administrative duties. She signs her name. She has to be seen to uphold the law. She cannot have officers running around on their own crusades, not thinking about the consequences.

That is not the type of precinct she will be responsible for.

Her former colleagues warned her about taking this job. To replace a beloved captain is always difficult. But to replace one killed in the line of duty is even more so.

She saw their faces after they'd returned from his home. All of them remain loyal to him and she's never going to break that loyalty. But then, perhaps she doesn't want to.

There's a strength in loyalty, especially in the job that they all do.

There is another form she needs to sign to make the other move from administrative to resignation.

But she doesn't sign that one. She shows her own form of loyalty.

She leaves the unsigned form on her desk.

Switches off the light.

Closes the door.

She smiles at the uniform that bids her a goodnight.

The elevator doors slide open and she steps inside.

She leans back against the wall. They've been hiding something from her, from the moment she arrived here.

One day, she hopes they'll trust her enough to tell her what is behind their secret looks and borrowed paperwork.

But for now, she's going home.

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So there we have Gates, anyone have any guesses about the other seven to come?


	2. Jenny

Thanks to the reviewers and to my fantastic beta :) I wonder if many of you predicted this person as someone who would get a part?

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**Eight in the Night.**

**Two: Jenny.**

He didn't call.

That was her first chance to worry.

He always calls. Some people (read her unmarried friends) call them overly affectionate. Gross. She thinks one of them called them.

But he always calls.

Even when it's 3am. He calls to say he's leaving the precinct and does she need anything.

But tonight he didn't call.

So she was surprised when he was home when she got home.

Even more so that he didn't get up to kiss her hello. He didn't even move towards her.

He's been like this before, he's a cop. She understands he sees things that would haunt her.

But this seems so different.

She asked if he wanted her to call someone, Beckett, Esposito even Castle. He shook his head as if that would be the worst thing she could even consider doing.

She offered him dinner. He pushed it around his plate.

She tried to tell him about her day – he normally listens so intently. He barely raised his eyes from his plate.

She suggested they take a walk after dinner, they sometimes do so. But tonight it was a no.

She busied herself with tidying the kitchen, she offered him coffee. He drank it. He smiled at her. She thought that was a breakthrough. She asked him what was wrong.

He told her that nothing stays the same.

She's worried. But he kissed her goodnight and told her he loved her. And no matter what he would always answer the phone if she needed him.

He went to bed.

She followed him soon after. He snuggled towards her.

She lay there thinking. Eventually she fell asleep.

But she woke up again. And he was gone.

She took his phone and tried to call Esposito. He didn't answer. Neither did Beckett and neither Castle.

She deleted the calls once she was done. That was her choice. She's his wife and she cares.

She found him eventually. Staring at the cold tea in front of him. She encouraged him back to bed. He came willingly. She thinks he's gone back to sleep. His breathing has evened out and the snuffling sounds have started.

But she can't sleep. Hundreds of thoughts run through her mind. All of them more worrying than the next. He's here next to her, her head is on his chest.

But he's never felt so far away.

Whatever happened today was serious. She's never seen him like this. And for none of his colleagues to answer his calls something must be wrong with them too.

She closes her fingers around a fistful of his t-shirt, holding him close. He's here with her for tonight. That's more than she had for many nights last summer, when he was off chasing gunmen.

She only hopes this isn't as bad. If only she could chase off the vacant look, the glazed eyes that say that his mind is anywhere but with her.

Because they seem to show her that this is worse.

Much worse.


End file.
